Rick and Morty: Rise of the Dead
by HellsingDMC
Summary: C-137 Rick ends up in a post zombie apocalyptic scenario without any ingredients to help him escape after running low on plutonic fluids and screwing up the coordinates on his portal gun; which rarely happens. He grabs Morty and flees the undead horde with nothing but the basics, abandoning the house along with whatever was left in Rick's garage that could've helped them survive.
1. Chapter 1

The rainy morning drizzles against the empty house as Rick mindlessly portals himself back into his regular timeline, landing inside the garage while carrying a bunch of alien materials that he needs for a new invention. He walks over towards the chair  
by his desk, placing some of the wires and circuit boards down carefully so he can rummage through which ones are compatible with Earth's technology, and which ones are too advanced to do anything with yet. Of course he could easily make them work  
with a little bit of time, but time isn't something that Rick's willing to give up freely. After deciding which materials are worth his valuable time he stores away the rest of them in a box underneath his shelf next to the kitchen door, glancing  
through the small window he notices the light is turned off. _Everyone probably went out, hopefully Morty listened to me before I left._ Rick mutters a few words under his breath before heading back to his desk across the garage. The rain  
patters against the windows and the roof, creating a small barrier between him and the world as if there wasn't one there already. The garage's folding door is left wide open to fully experience the sound of the rain hitting the sidewalk and drenching  
the outside world, creating a serene tranquility that words cannot describe on this dreary morning.

Rick takes a mental note of the lack of people walking on the sidewalk after a few minutes of having the garage door open, which limits his suspicions to anything 'out of the ordinary' for Earth such as intergalactic works, or perhaps an invasion like  
C-023 experienced last week. _Did I enter the right coordinates? This can't be human error._ Rickbegins to doubt himself, he'd stop making simple mistakes in his late thirties after blowing up several different dimensions throughout the universe,  
all accidental except for one or two which were intentional at the time for his own personal reasons. His curiosity gets the best of him and he glances over towards his portal gun's coordinates, noticing all of the numbers seem to be correct; however  
there's a small scratch covering the last digit which doesn't concern him too much. Breathing in a sigh of relief he begins to focus at his task at hand, if he messed up his own timeline's coordinates surely the other Rick's would torment him about  
it.

His nimble fingers dance over the oddly shaped piece of metal as he fiddles with tedious wires, checking to see if the circuit board is still working with every adjustment he makes. His mind stays focused on the task at hand but whenever he feels the  
thoughts from his past creeping up on him, he stops for a second and takes a swig of brandy from his half empty bottle that's off to the side. _Morty's taking forever, I shouldn't be surprised considering all of them are dumb in one way or another. How hard is it to find plutonic serum? I left it on the shelf next to the milk in the fridge. Maybe next time I should leave sticky notes with arrows pointing in the direction for his dumb little head._ He  
snorts a little, well aware of his bitter emotions towards his grandson, and anybody else for that matter. But it's for the better, emotions get in the way of whatever shenanigans Rick does throughout the universe and it could lead to disastrous results;  
too bad nobody understands except for him, and countless other Ricks around the dimensions.

He carefully makes a small nest of wires inside the center of his contraption with his long fingers, delicately placing the circuit board along with a supercharged battery connecting to a few of the wires in order to power up the digital aspect of his  
new device. The light blinks on the end of the foreign object while a small, subtle smile twitches across his lips. After a few moments of self-gloating over his new invention Rick sets it aside, fiddling with the dials to see if it'll actually work  
the way he wants it to. As he's turning one of the dials he hears a loud scream emit from inside the house, causing him to nearly drop his new creation to the concrete floor beneath him. Carefully he sets it down on the table, cursing under his breath  
while taking in a deep, agitated sigh. He eventually rises from his chair, staggering a little bit before catching himself and reaching for his bottle. _When I get my hands on Morty he'll pay for wasting my time. And why the hell did he scream like a little turd; unless he walked in on Jerry in the bathroom again..._ Rick  
opens the kitchen door to see what the hell's going on while steadying himself once more against the wall, a few warning signs trigger off throughout his mind keeping him on high alert. Surely nothing could take him by surprise after all the turmoil  
and hiding he's been doing for over forty years; he's practically seen it all by now.

The house looks eerie when it's empty; usually it's full of Jerry's lame voice questioning everything around him and Beth's unconscious thoughts regretting the fact that she even married him. There's enough tension in the air to strangle anyone who's  
not used to their toxic relationship; even when they're not here. Rick's glazed eyes wander around the kitchen noticing the cupboards were hastily open with a few cans of food missing, as well as boxes of crackers, cookies, cereal, and all kinds of  
other food turned over in a rush. The counter has a few smashed glasses here and there, as well as drops of blood smeared everywhere; on the walls, cupboard doors, the counter, and even on the floor. Rick dismisses any serious thoughts about the amount  
of blood and labelled it all as Jerry being a complete dumbass and smashing all of the glasses while cutting himself. _Jesus Jerry, did you try drinking or something?_ The thought of Jerry attempting to be an alcoholic amuses Rick greatly, the  
man's too stupid to do anything right at all.

The lights inside the house seem to be turned off, indicating that nobody should still be home. _Strange, did I miss a family gathering? Good._ He thought bitterly, the idea of spending time with Jerry's side of the family was a good enough reason  
to put a bullet through his head. He comes to a halt where spilled liquid from the opened fridge door seeps through the tiles on the kitchen floor mixed in with blood, hoping that it wasn't the plutonic serum but strongly having a feeling in the back  
of his head telling him that it is. _Damn it Morty if you dropped it then we can't use the portal gun for reckless things, I've only got half a jar left and the rest needs to be stabilized before we can use it._ The closer he gets to the spill,  
the angrier he feels. There's no mistaking that metallic scent mixed with chrome colours; it _was_ the plutonic serum. He rubs his temples with his fingers, taking in a deep breath before he begins to holler and shout like he normally does when  
he's fed up. Sometimes he feels as if Morty doesn't quite understand the precise actions needed to create stable experiments, all though he's well aware of how dumb Mortys truly are when it comes to dimensions and creations; he still can't help but  
get agitated over every small mistake his Morty makes. Sure Rick can whip up just about anything in a matter of minutes, but preparing the ingredients to be used in Earth's climate takes time which is something he hates wasting.

Rick steps over the spill and begins to head towards the staircase in the living room, noticing a familiar scent lingering throughout the air. His eyes catch sight of human-shaped shadows advancing towards the house through the living room window partially  
covered by thick curtains, as they scratch against the glass with their fingers, as well as noticing the entire living room is in a rushed mess. Papers, photos, and important documents are scattered around one of the end tables while shelves were  
hastily rummaged through, the glass coffee table is completely shattered with blood everywhere, one of the smaller couches happened to be turned over on its side as well as one of the bookshelves that contained a lot of Beth's mother's stuff. _I forgot her name... How could I have forgotten her name..?_ He  
narrows his eyes towards the photo of Beth's mother, straining his mind in the hopes of remembering her name. Ever since he walked out he picked up a bottle and forgot a lot about his past, he'd rather keep it that way too.

Rick's eyes manage to spot a bloody handprint smeared across the sliding glass door, swallowing the sickening feeling that's rising up from his stomach. _I'm sure Beth made it out fine, it's probably Jerry's blood anyways._ He assures himself, hoping  
for the best that maybe Jerry would risk his dumb life for his little girl. Immediately he faces the staircase where the scream came from, his eyes catch a silver object lying down on one of the bottom steps. Carefully he reaches over, picking up  
a butcher's knife from that kitchen that's already coated in blood and smells of death. _How long was I gone for? It couldn't have been more than a day._ He hears the familiar cries from his grandson on the top floor once again, while letting  
out another deep sigh. _Maybe it was three days..._

Rick approaches the bottom of the staircase and he pats himself down, reaching inside one of his lab coat pockets and pulling out a grey flask. He quickly uncaps it and takes a swig from the strong vodka bourbon mix, recapping it and placing it back inside  
his pocket while wiping his mouth on his sleeve. _I'm getting too old for this shit._ He sluggishly makes his way up the carpet steps towards the dimly lit hallway, gripping the handle of the knife and taking note of the sickly scent growing  
stronger.

To the left is Beth and Jerry's room, which is oddly darker than usual as well as leaving a weird chill in the air. With just a quick glance Rick notices that their bedroom looks _identical_ to the living room, drawers tossed on the floor with clothes  
thrown in every direction, blankets torn off the bed, and a few bottles of wine leaking onto the carpet. He doesn't bother flicking on the light to fully investigate; he can already tell that they packed up whatever they could and fled without looking  
back. _Some family gathering, maybe I should be a little concerned._ Rick forces himself to head down towards the end of the hall where Morty's room is, right across from Summer's detailing the strong scent once more followed by the cries and  
a strange noise he's never heard before coming from one of their rooms. His eyes narrow, half of him wants to see what the fuss is about however the other half of him regrets coming up the steps and wanting to head back down to finish his new invention.  
He slowly begins to move down the end of the hall, steadying himself with a hand on the wall and hearing the desperate cries mixed with a few snarling noises that sound inhuman. _Wonderful, somebody tracked an alien creature through the dimensions again. Why does nobody listen to me when I say wash your damn hands?_

As Rick approaches the end of the hall the smell hits him like a truck. It reeks of decaying flesh that's been sitting up here for days going unnoticed, followed by the inhuman snarling emitting from Morty's room. Without another word he turns the corner  
fully prepared to see his grandson being ripped apart by some undead creature; except he was only _half_ right.

In the middle of the room Summer's corpse continues to bash it's crippled hands against the closet door where Morty trapped himself in the hopes of Rick finding him eventually. _Damn it Morty_. Her cracked lips open and close while hissing and snarling  
at the cries coming from the closet; leaving him stunned for a split second. Rick quickly glances around the room looking for a weapon of some sort to stagger her backwards, knowing that he'll have to act fast after realizing that he set down his  
portal gun in the garage, and didn't bother to bring anything with him to defend himself with since he clearly wasn't expecting _this_. He reaches for a lamp that's on Morty's dresser, unplugging it just as Summer's corpse turns her fixated  
attention towards him. Her face appears to be slightly ripped off, exposing a few muscles around her cheeks that didn't get damaged, one of her eyes is barely hanging inside of her socket whereas the other one is completely clouded over, erasing any  
shred of humanity trapped inside her rotting body. On one of her shoulders there appears to be a massive bite wound that looks highly infectious. Piecing together the evidence, Rick silently curses under his breath realizing that he's entered an apocalyptic  
timeline full of reanimated life. _Impossible, the coordinates were right..._ He thought, racking his brain once more to see if he overlooked any small details previously;

 _the scratch._

The left sides of her pants are stained with massive amounts of dried blood followed by huge gashes around her torso, indicating that the knife he found earlier was definitely used on her at some point today, or yesterday. She begins to stagger on weak  
ankles and a twisted leg towards Rick in a slow manner, grasping at him with her dry, skinless fingers from scratching on the closet door for who knows how long. He raises the lamp and immediately brings it down on top of her head sending her stumbling  
backwards as well as shattering the lamp to several pieces from the force of the blow, feeling no remorse for what he had just done. There's a huge gash outlined where he struck her on the forehead, revealing bits of her cracked skull from the strike.  
The closet door opens a little bit after hearing the loud noise, revealing half of Morty's face with terrified eyes full of tears and guilt aimed directly towards Rick.

"M-Mo- _uurrp-_ rty grab something you dingus, b-beat her over the he- _urrp-_ ad or something!" Rick hollers over the angry snarls, he grips the knife tightly knowing that he's going to have to somehow pierce her skull with a dull kitchen blade.  
He quickly analyzes the entrance points to her brain, through the eye socket or chance it with the cracked skull that's exposed on her forehead. After a split second of precise decision making he jabs the sharp end through Summer's eye socket, pushing  
it further in until the corpse stops moving and slumps over, grasping at him one last time before falling to the floor in a heap of unmoving, rotting flesh with blood spewing from the hole. Morty eventually opens the closet door, looking dazed and  
scared as he tries to step over Summer's body; terrified that it'll come back to life at any moment again as well as staring at his grandfather awkwardly, considering he showed no emotion whatsoever while ending his sister's life.

"Wha-what the _hell_ Morty, you couldn't kill your sister— _again_? Believe me, it wasn't h- _uurrp_ -ard." Without another moment to lose Rick grabs his grandson by the arm, hauling him away from his bedroom with tears flowing over Morty's  
cheeks as they rush towards the stairs in the hopes of escaping the reanimated life outside their home. Faintly Rick can make out the sound of more snarling and angry moans coming from downstairs, realizing that he'd left the garage door open to air  
out the garage. _Fuck, well I guess that one's on me._

"What was I supposed to do Rick, she wa-was my s-sister..." Morty stumbles over his words, trying to hold back tears once more for what he had just witnessed. " _Was_ your sister. She's dead no- _uurrp_ -w." Rick corrects him, completely desensitized  
towards killing his granddaughter. Morty stays silent, unable to form a response to an answer quite like that. He knew his grandfather was reckless and had sociopathic tendencies but he didn't think he could just end the life of somebody who's family  
and not blink an eye. Morty's terrified eyes dart around the hallway, expecting something else to jump out at them like Summer had. He notices a long metal rod from the heater that was kicked in and picks it up, gripping the makeshift weapon tightly  
while staying close to his grandfather, fully understanding the unknown circumstances outside of his home.

Quietly Rick approaches the stairwell, listening towards the staggering monstrosities that invaded downstairs within a matter of minutes, probably drawn in from the noise that was happening up here. _The only thing that's stupider than a Morty would be the living dead._ He  
thought, probably the only compliment he'd _ever_ give a Morty. He motions Morty to stay upstairs and to keep his mouth shut as he carefully inches halfway down the staircase, with his eyes widening in horror at the scene before him. About a  
dozen of them had already made their way inside the house judging by the smell and the strange gurgling sounds they emit. A few of them wander around the living room tracking blood and smearing dirt throughout the home, and each of them appears to  
have been bitten in one way or another. Some of them have broken limbs, torn up faces, there's at least one of them crawling on the floor due to their legs being mangled, and a few others missing an arm or such. One in particular has intestines spewing  
out onto the floor from a huge hole, dripping stomach acid and who knows what else onto Beth's expensive rug; one way or another Rick knows that he'll have to get through to the garage with his life still intact, or he'll have to abandon everything  
he's worked on for his entire life and run like his daughter did in the hopes of finding her once again after walking out on her years ago.


	2. Chapter 2

Several miles just outside of the town, there's a small green car dodging abandoned vehicles, and a few reanimated bodies on the road. Packed full of old family photos, a box of usable weapons such as hatchets, hammers, a few tools, boxes full of canned food, and a few blankets for when they have to stop for the night to rest. Beth's head slumps against the passenger window in a deep sleep fuelled by exhaustion, with a shotgun resting on her lap and a cloth pouch full of bullets strung through a belt loop on her waist. Her clothes are already tattered and stained with blood that isn't her's or Jerry's, as well as several rips in her jeans from running through a few potted thorn bushes to reach the parked car during an attempt to find gas at a nearby gas station hours ago.

Jerry's hands grip the wheel firmly during the long drive to find a safe place to pull over for the night, keeping his eyes focused on the road while constantly glancing down at his bandaged left hand. They were attacked by a family that lived next door several hours ago, during the escape Jerry smashed the glass coffee table in the living room to use a large chunk of glass to slash at their throats as a weapon, and sliced his palm wide open in the process; leaving blood everywhere as he attempted to open the sliding back door to make a run for it while Beth finished them off. Looking back on it now, it didn't seem like a good idea to begin with, he's well aware that the wound will need a lot of stitches; and possibly surgery to recover full movement in his fingers but he wasn't thinking about the consequences back then. None of that is on his mind right now, his thoughts are fixated on his kids that he had to leave behind from the chaotic streets. Swarms of people trying to pack whatever they could into their vehicles, only to be bitten and infected like the rest of them. Deeper inside the city the undead litter the streets, blocking any pathways to get in or out; eliminating hope for the lingering survivors that managed to avoid the outbreak as it happened over the course of a few days. Nobody really knows what exactly happened, besides the fact that it took over the entire town in about four days and whoever was killed by it started walking around and attacking the living.

An hour goes by rather quickly, the abandoned houses and farmland along the road have several stumbling figures in the distance, knowing that they aren't living anymore Jerry tries to move past it thinking of something else, but his mind seems to be halted on the haunting images of the living dead. _Could Rick have something to do with this?_ He thought automatically. Jerry never understood Rick's inventions at all, and keeping alien prisoners locked up in a secret underground basement in the garage seems like a gateway to destroying planets, so surely something like this could easily happen at the hands of a madman; which Rick certainly is without a doubt.

The car carries on through the late afternoon, rumbling over the small bumps in the old road as the sun begins to set behind the horizon full of trees and hills. Jerry's mind eventually drifts towards Rick, wondering if he hopped into another timeline once he realized this one was falling apart and wasn't worth saving, and if he's already taking that Morty on adventures, ridiculing that Jerry with comebacks, ignoring that Summer as one of his grandchildren, and manipulating that Beth with words that she only wants to hear all while he stays rent-free in that Smith's house that's probably identical to the one they currently have right now. He could never figure out what was going through Rick's mind; probably because it was too complex for him to understand, that and Rick seemed deeply invested in the other universes than his own. There will be days where Rick forgets the word 'human,' but he could remember _Gazorpazorp_ , _Sneeble_ , or _Floozle_ -whatevers; but his own race? It's like he forgot about it and built his own for himself throughout the countless other species he encountered. Even though Jerry's completely oblivious to the way how dimensions and multi universes work, he's familiar with the way how Rick uses his family as pawns on a much larger chess board, and wonders if he even feels any sort of remorse or guilt for doing it.

The radio stopped working about two hours ago and there's nothing but static playing through the speakers, accompanied by the sound of the tires rolling over the pavement at a fast pace for the past few miles. Jerry could turn off the radio and put in a few CDs to listen to, but he chooses to leave the static on; as a reminder that the world had stopped moving and nobody knows what to do about it.  
Beth stirs around in her sleep, a small stream of tears begin to spill out from under her closed eyelids as she suddenly jolts herself wide awake with panicked, short breaths. She lets out an irritated sigh, gripping the shotgun's barrel tightly before realizing that she's sitting in the passenger seat of her own car, steadily moving down one of the back roads away from the real nightmare that's going on outside in the real world.

"It's hard to even sleep." She mutters under her breath, releasing her grip on the shotgun to wipe away the tears while glancing outside of the car's window in an attempt to clear her mind of whatever caused her to jolt awake like that. Jerry's eyes peel away from the road for a second, giving her a reassuring look before returning his attention to the road. He knows that her thoughts are on the kids as well, and if anything she had a nightmare about them. "We didn't have a choice, the roads were full of people trying to leave, and the school was already overrun, we couldn't go back—" He began, suddenly being cut off by Beth's annoyed sigh.  
"Don't talk about our kids like that. They're alive." She flatly retorts, crossing her arms in front of her and returning her lifeless gaze to the window. Her psyche seems to be damaged and out of balance, Beth's well aware that over ninety percent of the city is infected and dead but she refuses to admit that her kids are probably gone.

Jerry's eyes return to the road once more with an uneasy expression on his face, the palm of his left hand pulsates viciously with the amount of pressure he has applied to the steering wheel. He doesn't want to hurt Beth by bringing them up, he just wants her to know that they left the two most important people in their lives back there to die; and they could've waited at home to see if Morty would show up before hastily packing everything up and taking off after watching Summer turn in a matter of minutes along with the rest of their neighborhood. In Jerry's mind, it's a good thing they got out when the could, or else they could've been stuck back there, or worse. However Beth doesn't see it like that at all; he didn't want to abandon his children, but they didn't have a choice.

"Honey, you looked at Summer's bite before she turned, remember—" Jerry tries to reason with her, they were both home when Summer stumbled through the door in hysterics complaining about some weird creep biting her on the shoulder on her way home from class; and within minutes of returning home she collapsed on the hallway floor, and started convulsing. Which prompted Beth to hit the floor right beside her daughter, ripping off Summer's coat revealing the massive bite wound on her shoulder that started turning Summer's veins into a deep purple colour underneath her pale skin; reawakening her into a walking corpse and lunging at Beth's face with her wild fingers and her cloudy pupils piercing her's as Jerry slipped away into the kitchen to grab a knife.

Beth's eyes begin to tear up once more, wiping them away briskly.

"Morty's still alive." Her voice comes out a little harsh, annoyed with the fact that Jerry wants to discuss the importance on if their kids were still alive or not while being miles away from them. Her body language shows that she's not capable of talking about it at this moment, her eyes keep glancing in the rear view mirror towards one of the small boxes of wine they managed to find in their bedroom before taking off. Even though Rick hasn't been there for most of her life she sure does have his tendencies when it comes to alcohol and deeply rooted trauma.

Jerry quietly glances forward, holding back on what he wants to say while swerving around an abandoned caved-in truck that has two passengers ripped to shreds coated in blood and the driver gnawing on them. Moments after they passed the wreckage the image still lingers inside of his mind, making his blood run cold.

"You know he has a disability, Beth. He was probably one of the first to turn—"  
"How could you _say_ that about our son!? I _know_ he's alive. Dad wouldn't leave him to die." Her eyes flare towards him in a fury of rage. Her fingers begin to tremble, clutching the shotgun's barrel an attempt to steady them.

Jerry lets out a long, agitated sigh.

"He left _you_ , didn't he? Who's to say he wouldn't leave Morty too if Morty's still alive?" He shot back in retaliation without even thinking, he's been fed up with how Beth always defended Rick and his multi universe 'explorations' with Morty; which usually ended in intergalactic fistfights and probably death threats with strange alien missiles aimed towards the house, or something. Not to mention the galactic parties he always threw by destabilizing time and distorting reality. Jerry tried reaching out to Rick in the past when he first started living with them, only to be shot down and humiliated in front of his family by a man who abandoned his previous wife and child to explore the universe. Jerry gave him his chance, but Rick refused to take it and continued to do whatever he wanted.

Beth instantly bursts into tears the second Jerry finishes his sentence, covering her face with both of her hands while the tears began to trickle down her cheeks and onto her tattered shirt. "H-He came b-back, didn't h-he..? He came b-back to us; to m- _me_..." The words barely escape from her lips without triggering a few pauses to collect herself, Jerry takes note with how distraught Beth is and begins to slow the car down, pulling over on the gravel and waiting until they came to a complete stop. A part of him wants to hold her until she finishes crying, but he knows that she was never the type to appreciate any affection and would yell at him to leave her alone; he already did enough damage to her anyways.

Jerry's eyes begin to mist a little at the sight of seeing his wife cry, he doesn't know verbally how much Rick means to her since she never talked about it, but he knows that Rick is all she has left now on her side of the family and after years of never hearing from him she probably wants to spend every second she can with him. "I-I'm sorry Beth, I'm just trying to think rationally here—" He protests, realizing that he messed up with his sudden outburst towards his wife, maybe he should just stop talking, for the sake of their marriage and mentality.

" _Rationally_? Morty is our _son_ , Jerry. What's rational about thinking that he's gone, or that Rick abandoned him? He's alive, I just know it." She eventually calms down, wiping away more tears from her eyes with her sleeve and turns her attention towards him. "Dad wasn't there for my childhood, but he's here for Morty's and that's all that matters to me."

Jerry's eyes stay focused on the road in front of him, bits of blood begin to seep through the gauze on his hand from gripping the steering wheel.

"I'm sorry, let's just set up for the night and we'll continue moving tomorrow." Jerry tries to calm her down with his words, too timid to physically touch her calmly. He turns off the car's ignition, hopping out and opening the door to grab the blankets from the back seat. "I want to go back. We _have_ to, what were we thinking leaving Morty and dad behind..?" Her tearful eyes pierce his, in all of the years he's been with her he's never seen her cry this much before, which causes him a great amount of pain pounding inside of his chest. He ignores her comment at first, thinking about valid reasons to _not_ return back there, Rick travels the universe with Morty; they're probably long gone anyways, that and the streets are clogged with crashed vehicles and the living dead, is there even a way back inside the city? He doesn't even know.

Jerry opens the back door, pulling out a couple of blankets from around the box of canned foods. He quickly scans around the area, surrounded by trees and the sound of birds echoing throughout the countryside. He slams the door shut and heads back to the driver's side, passing Beth a blanket with a sincere smile on his face.

"First thing tomorrow, okay?" He reaches for her hand after he closes the door behind him, intertwining his fingers with hers. Beth flinches away at first, not really used to him willing to touch her, but eventually she accepts his kind gesture. She slowly nods her head with a small smile. "Okay." She squeezes his hand while letting go of his fingers, pulling the blanket up around her shoulders while wrapping herself up in a content bundle of warmth full of thoughts and memories of family that was left behind. "Rick would never abandon Morty, Jerry." She turns her head towards the window, nodding off once more leaving Jerry wide awake to think about what Beth had just said to him.

* * *

The house is full of undead creatures roaming around downstairs. The only rational thought circulating through Rick's mind is to escape somehow from one of the bedroom windows even though there's quite a drop. There's no way he'll make it to the garage in one piece to his portal gun; porting him and Morty out of this timeline to start fresh with the amounts of reanimated people downstairs. _Shit, why did I leave that thing behind?!_ He slams his hand against the railing without thinking, holding his breath afterwards and hoping the corpses downstairs didn't hear the noise he accidentally made. A few of them stop moving around and fixate on the staircase, eventually losing interest in it after stumbling over to the steps to check out the sudden noise without noticing Rick or Morty huddled by the edge of the wall.

Rick closes his eyes in an attempt to figure out a plan, he hasn't felt this hopeless in a _long time_. He reaches inside one of his pockets for his flask, taking another few swigs from it to calm his nerves. He's never been without his portal gun or any of his weapons ever since he created them years ago, but now he's stuck between his inventions and a dozen of flesh-eating monsters without anything sturdy enough to use as a solid weapon. Supposedly the pipe Morty has could take out a couple of them, but all he has is a screwdriver and a dull kitchen knife, one of them would definitely get grabbed before they'd even make it to the door. Upstairs the house is quiet, so far none of the noise from earlier attracted any of those things on the main floor which is a good sign, however the limited choice of weapons could make or break this getaway.

Morty's hands clench the metal pipe tightly, reminding himself over and over again that those 'people' downstairs aren't alive anymore, and if anything he'd be doing them a favor by killing them to put them out of their misery. "I-I think we just have to do it, Rick." His voice quivers a little bit while gripping the metal pipe firmly. He's come a long way ever since he's been travelling the universe with Rick, he used to be terrified of every alien they came across, even the docile ones and he was never reliable whenever they got in trouble; it was always Rick who had to do the thinking. His eyes skim past Rick's with a slight nod of his head, showing him that he's ready to follow whatever crazy idea he has.

Rick's lips twitch into small smirk; feeling slightly proud for his grandson's actions instead of freaking out and having a mental breakdown like he used to do before whenever a scenario like this one appeared. _I guess the little turd's finally getting a hang of the real world_. He thought, quickly hiding his small grin before Morty catches on and notices.

"Well Mo- _urrpp_ -rty I-I guess we just gotta do it then, get it over an-and done wi- _urrpp_ -th, huh?" Rick's eyes widen with pure excitement, he always killed without feeling any remorse whatsoever which helped relieve a bit of the past's stress, all though it's nowhere near a healthy outlet for the resentment he has with himself. Instead of him doing all of the work, he'll have Morty helping him like he did during the purging planet a few months ago, which is definitely a step up for a Morty's standards. Within seconds, Rick comes up with a new plan that doesn't involve jumping to their death from one of the windows; and that's fighting their way out with whatever they can find, and to kill as many of these abominations as they can without getting infected themselves and returning back to the house when the herd thins out; however long that will take Rick is willing to wait, he'd do anything for his inventions especially his portal gun.


	3. Chapter 3

After a few seconds, Rick glances over his shoulder towards Morty, while quickly skimming around for any last minute weapons to help them last minute; just in case Rick overlooked something with his over reactive imagination a few moments ago. _How the hell is this going to work? I better make sure I have enough time to think of a route if things get_ _bad_. He thought, slightly worried for his and Morty's sake in case the worst _does_ end up happening. _The undead's attracted to noises, we can only be quiet for so long_. "Try not to make any su _-uurrp_ -dden noises, Morty." Rick mutters under his breath as quietly as he can, after realizing that there is in fact nothing valuable to use up here besides what they already have. Morty nods his head briefly without saying anything back in fear of being targeted by the corpses in the living room. His fingers tighten around the pipe, fully aware of what's happening downstairs and the consequences for being caught by one of them. There isn't much up here to use that'll do enough damage to help them run, unless Rick wants to risk breaking the railing and using the wooden poles to spear their way out; but that might make too much noise and attract more of them, so he doesn't bother.

A few red flags pop off inside Rick's mind, the possibility of his plan not working the way he wants to definitely keeps repeating itself. Even if they manage to make a path to the back door there's always the unknown factor of what's lurking around outside; that and what to _do_ once they get outside _. It can't be that bad down there._ Rick quietly begins to make his way down the creaky steps, avoiding most of the weak spots as he can so that way it doesn't draw attention to the both of them, while shoving all of his doubts and insecurities to the back of his head; along with the sudden urge to take another swig from his flask.

He begins to relive every bit of pent up aggression he has left in his body from the lack of alcohol in his system, remembering crucial moments in his life where he felt truly angry at the universe. One recurring memory that keeps replaying inside of his mind happened decades ago, when he ported home in the middle of the living room after being gone for over several months and walked in on his wife being railed by some other guy against the couch. A part of him knew it would happen eventually but he chose to ignore it, and after realizing the damage of him being constantly in and out of her's and Beth's life he decided to isolate himself in the depths of the universe to never hurt them again. The anger still burns deeply, rooted inside of him permanently all of these years later. He never tried to hurt the man either, he simply walked downstairs to the basement with her following behind him begging and pleading to reason with her, grabbed whatever he could salvage invention-wise, kissed Beth on the head when she got home from school moments later, and ported out never to be heard from again; up until recently when he decided it was time to take his Morty with him to continue his intergalactic shenanigans _._

 _I should've listened to Birdperson, I should've taken them both with me._ Rick stops dead in his tracks remembering that event, his fingers twitch a little by his side while gripping the blade, itching to stab whatever he can get his hands on to relieve him of the stress and pain from the past that he chose to forget. _But she told me she wanted Beth to have a normal life, so I didn't bother._

At first he was just there to grab Morty and use him to conceal his brainwaves from the Galactic Federation, but after a month or two he found solitude in his daughter's company after walking out all of those years ago and for once he felt at peace with himself for the decision he made. He thought it would've been better if he just left to do his own thing without holding neither of them back, but he didn't realize how much Beth loved him until he came back years later, and he'll never forgive himself for leaving her in the first place.

Eventually Rick regains control over his deadpan emotions, bottling up every last bit and burying it back down deep inside his conscious. _I need to find more booze later, and fast. That relapse could have taken my life and I'll be damned if it happens again._ He begins to mentally map out a route and which corpses to kill to reach the sliding door to the backyard with the least amount of problems with each step he takes towards the main floor, after that he has no way of telling how many are outside, or where to go for that matter. He has his eyes set on one of the corpses beside the steps, lingering beside a fallen bookshelf and just standing there as if it has a mind of its own; dazed and confused but definitely dead— _undead._

He motions Morty to follow him down with a slight nod of his head, watching the panic rise inside of his grandson before he collects himself. _Come on Morty, it's not that hard. I could be asking for you to replace that plutonic serum you spilled; but we'd be here for days, or even years with your dumb little head._ Rick's eyes pierce his for a few seconds _,_ in an attempt to subtly tell him to get his shit together and fight the undead when the time comes. Morty takes in a deep breath before following Rick down the stairs, gripping the pipe firmly and fully understanding the subtle message thrown at him.

The smell of the rotting corpses begins to make Rick gag, he's been near toxic waste plants, horribly smelling alien creatures that reek of weird odors, and a handful of other scenarios that doesn't pale in comparison to this; the smell of decomposing flesh, and whatever else that begins to fester inside the body of a bloated corpse. Years of being exposed to sensitive smells could never prepare anybody for a scent as strong as this one.

Another memory begins to resurface during the few moments where he begins to feel sober. In the past, every once in awhile Rick would port back to Earth just to see how his family was doing; but before anything crippling could emerge he regains control once again, erasing the thoughts from his mind once more. _Not now, and definitely not here. Why is this happening now?_ Angrily he tries to conceal everything deep down inside of him, he never liked expressing his feelings and he sure as hell wasn't going to start today.

As soon as Morty reaches the last step; Rick lunges towards the nearest corpse by the bookshelf with his screwdriver and with every ounce of angry energy he has, releasing all of that aggression he felt years ago into one burst, wrangling the corpse down against the bottom platform with it's angry snarls and clawed fingers grasping wildly in the air desperately trying to latch onto him. Morty stands there almost in a complete shock, he's seen Rick take out a few aliens before, but never like this. A few nearby ones begin to fixate on Rick as he pierces the flailing corpse's skull through the eye socket with the screwdriver, he feels a slight _pop_ after reaching the back of the skull and within seconds the front of his shirt and his face become coated in dark blood splattering all over him with a sickly scent attached. _I miss that feeling, I should probably get help once this is all over._ His lips curl into a small sneer, a part of him definitely feels much better after attacking the nearest thing but he can't help it; it just feels _so_ good. Glancing up he notices the one with its intestines hanging out inches away from him with its face dangerously close to his, the scent of rotting flesh grows stronger the closer it is. Rick grips the knife in his other hand, preparing himself for the worst, getting ready to push the corpse away so that way he has time to lunge again.

Before Rick could even do anything, Morty takes a step down and swings his pipe straight at its head just like Rick had done to Summer's corpse in his bedroom. The sound of the metal pipe hitting the undead echoes throughout the house, causing a few more to take interest towards their direction. _All right Morty! I knew those trips would harden you up for combat._ Rick flashes a quick smile to him, showing Morty that he still has his humanity intact and that he's proud of the sudden action he took instead of cowering away like he usually did. The dazed corpse stumbles backwards while Rick stands up on his feet, wiping the blood off of his face with his sleeve; smirking. He grabs the corpse's shoulder and begins stabbing the body repeatedly in the torso with the kitchen knife before reaching for its head, and shoving the knife up through the lower section of its jaw to the brain, releasing more blood as it covers his hand and a part of his sleeve completely.

Morty's jaw drops. It was one thing seeing Rick purge for fun, and another when he created a small gladiator ring to pick off all of the genius microorganisms in his Microverse battery to avoid another paradox, but to watch him blindly run into a dozen of corpses with barely any weapons definitely makes him wonder what's really going on inside Rick's mind to make him so reckless. Rick holds the knife there for a few seconds while the corpse squirms, before falling limp in his grasp. He gazes around the room again, noticing a few more piling inside the house from the garage door in the kitchen, increasing the number of bodies walking around and realizing that his plan to fight their way out won't go over so well. _Fuck, we have to leave. There's too many. I'll have to come back for my portal gun when the crowd thins out._ The thought of leaving his portal gun resting on his work table surrounded by stumbling undead monstrosities makes Rick feel a little uneasy, but there's nothing else he can do about it.

"M-M- _urrp-_ orty we gotta go— like _now_!" Rick hollers over the snarling and gurgling noises shaking his blood coated hand aside in an attempt to get rid of some of it. Causing more attention from the kitchen with his voice. He grips the knife tightly, ripping it out of the corpse's jaw and splattering more blood all over the house and a little bit on Morty, in case he needs to use it again. The corpses stumble aimlessly towards the two of them, growling and reaching out for them with their mangled fingers. _I don't have time for this shit._ Rick kicks the one closest to them down on the floor and jumps over the toppled couch, with Morty right behind him. Slamming himself against the glass door, Rick desperately begins prying it open with his blood soaked fingers as Morty begins to bash the dozens of undead slowly moving in on them.

"Rick seriously, open the door I-I can't keep this up—" Morty began, only to be cut off halfway through his sentence. "Gee Morty, wh-why don't you try opening this door with your fingers coated in sticky shit." Rick sarcastically retorts, wiping his bloody hands on his pants and shutting up Morty instantly. "Didn't think so, hu- _uurrp_ -h?"

Morty continues to swing his battered pipe against the crowd in silence knowing that there's no point in arguing with him. He swings once more crushing the skull of one of the decaying corpses, ripping off bits of its skin and hair with each blow he delivers. Rick's fingers slip away from the small door handle once more, he curses under his breath while smearing more blood against the glass. Morty swings once more at a massive corpse that emerged from the kitchen and made its way towards the two of them, causing it to tumble backwards into a few more, pinning them down on the floor underneath the massive bloated body; buying them a few more seconds. Rick finally gets the door to open, grabbing Morty's arm and hauling him out into the yard with the other corpses grasping at him within seconds of being yanked away from the slowly moving crowd.

Once they get outside Rick does a quick skim of the area noticing nothing in the backyard— yet, as Morty slams the door shut behind them. The corpses inside begin pressing their bodies against the glass door, smearing all kinds of fluid on the surface while trying to reach the two of them outside. There's over a dozen of them crowding inside against the glass door, lowering Rick's optimistic view on returning here soon to grab his portal gun and a few other inventions. The sun begins to set in the distance casting an eerie shadow along the empty neighborhood, a street that was once full of life; people walking their dogs on the sidewalk, children playing in the front yard, even stray cats darting around the houses, has nothing but complete silence lingering throughout the empty streets, not even the sound of birds chirping like they usually do throughout the day. _I'd kill to have a normal day on Earth again. Even if I have to kill every last one of these freaks so that way we can start over in this timeline._ He lingers on that thought for a little longer, they abandoned their old timeline after it was taken over by Morty-crazy mutants after a small slip up experiment wise, as well as in the past he abandoned a few other nuclear explosions that happened on Earth, and a couple in the universe. He'll be damned if he loses this timeline as well.

Along the road there's a few bodies stumbling around, as well as a few abandoned cars they could hotwire last minute if need be, not to mention it could be possible to break into a few homes to look for food and water as well as more supplies and hopefully abandoned firearms.

Rick breathes in deeply, the fresh air feels amazing after being trapped inside with rotting flesh, and fluids for who knows how long. He reaches inside his pocket and pulls out his flask, quickly uncapping it and taking another swig to wash down those memories from before. Morty stands close to him, clenching the battered pipe in his hands that has bits of flesh and tissue clinging to the metal. "So now what, do we walk? I-Is there even a place to go..?" He questions Rick, who wipes his other sleeve along his mouth while recapping his flask, gazing off towards the wooden shed Jerry used for his lame unfinished projects. "I don't know. Wait, wha-what's in the sh- _uurrp-_ ed?" Carefully Rick begins to move across the yard towards the shed where Jerry moved all of his useless junk to, when Rick took over the garage for his inventions. At this point anything is better than a shitty pipe and a dull kitchen blade, and Rick is willing to risk anything to make sure he gets out alive, with Morty by his side. Morty questions it as well, if anything Jerry just tossed everything they don't use in there from years ago. The silence from outside creates a high tension in the air, Rick pushes against the door noticing that it's unlocked. _Wow Jerry, you couldn't figure out how to use a lock? That's a new low for you._ He opens both of the wooden doors revealing a pile of useless junk, a lawnmower, some golf clubs, gardening gloves, pretty much nothing useful in a zombie apocalypse. _If this wasn't Jerry's shed I would've assumed all of this was Beth's, what did she even see in him anyways?_ He thought to himself, either way it all worked out for everybody in the end; Jerry's genetics practically cancelled out his genius ones, which is why Morty masks his brainwaves perfectly well so even though he strongly hates Jerry, there wouldn't be a Morty without him.

Morty also begins to poke around, he slides himself past the golf clubs deeper inside the shed while Rick glances around cautiously behind him to make sure nothing sneaks up on them. After a few minutes of poking around, Morty speaks up. "I-I think I found something—" Morty pulls out a wood splitting axe, with a few screwdrivers and a hammer buried deep within the back of the shed from when they used to have bonfires as kids in the backyard. The axe itself is at least ten years old, whereas the hammer is slightly rusty from the rain leaking through the roof that Jerry never got around to fixing. He gazes up at Rick with a huge smile on his face, feeling happy and content that the shed has some useful tools that could help them run away. A sigh of relief escapes Rick's lips, that's one problem checked off the list; now onto the next few, where the hell are they going to go, how are they getting there, and what are they taking with them?

"Alright let's get ou- _uurrp-_ tta here an-and find a car or somethi- _uurrp-_ ng." Rick glances back once more, noticing a shadowy figure slowly making their way past the house into the backyard, moving in the same fashion as the ones inside the house were. _Here we go again..._ Morty hands him the axe and screwdrivers to use to gouge out the corpse's eyes, as soon as he picks up on the shadowy figure while Rick tosses away the kitchen knife onto the grass to avoid making a loud noise.

He holds the axe looking it over, swinging it a couple of times in the air to get the feel of it. Just as he's about to swing it for a third time a corpse begins gurgling in the distance that's coming into view, turning around Rick quickly begins to sprint at it with the axe in hand, he swings the axe full force into the side of its head, creating a sickening sound as the blade comes in contact with its skull. He then kicks the body forward while gripping the axe to pull it out of its head since it got deeply embedded, swinging it again directly in the neck in an attempt to behead the mangled corpse. He severs the jugular, draining blood all over the grass as the body topples over, writhing around and emitting a weird noise as Rick brings down the axe once more in the middle of its forehead; silencing the noises and movement while splattering blood all over the grass, and on his pants and shoes. Morty emerges from the shed, closing the doors while gripping the hammer in one hand and the pipe in another looking slightly horrified at the mess Rick made but knowing that it had to be done.

"Let's g- _uurrp-_ o, Morty." Rick steps over the lifeless body, walking towards the sidewalk as the sun sets behind them, causing the streetlights to turn on illuminating the empty neighborhood. The thought of breaking into a couple homes to see what they have and if it's possible to spend the night creeps into Rick's mind, he hasn't been looting in ages and he's been itching to stir up some trouble somewhere in the galaxy and since he doesn't have his inventions with him he'll have to start here on Earth.

Lately he's been doing fine with his 'intergalactic terrorist' behavior as the Federation puts it, he ported to universes out of district to gather materials to make inventions with, sure he got into a few shady deals by selling weapons that he created, or demolishing a few planets here and there in the past, and porting into government buildings to take whatever he wanted, but all he wants to do now is his own thing, and there hasn't really been any wars ever since the last one which should've ended all future wars so he doesn't really have a good reason to mess with the government; other than the fact that they enslave other planets to take away their individual freedom, and everyone who fought in the wars are supposed to be contained behind bars in an Intergalactic prison. In the back of his mind, he can't help but wonder if this outbreak was part of a plan by the Federation; to get Rick to portal out so they can catch him. After all, he doesn't know how this started so it could be possible but the jokes on them, he left his portal gun in the garage with countless other inventions and it got overrun by the living dead so he has to stay here in this timeline until he can get into the garage.

All he did was fight in the Freedom Wars, and helped the resistance with whatever they needed since the government was starting laws on infecting planets with their string of forces to eliminate all 'shady' activities, and to dictate what people did with their lives and to him it didn't seem right. Earth was under this category; and if it wasn't for him and several others then Earth would've been put into high security and there would be Federation corps everywhere, ruining the freedom and choices for everybody worldwide and limiting the amount of progress Earth did to evolve with their technology.

Rick can't help but wonder what's going to happen to this planet now that it's infested with the mindless undead; it could get blown up by the Feds if they find out what happened to it for all he knows. He reaches for his flask once more, noticing how significantly lighter it's getting, instead of uncapping it he just lets out a long sigh; placing it back inside of his pocket to save the last remaining bit of alcohol for when he'll really need it while the small buzz he has going on slowly begins to fade away, clearing up his memories and his thoughts.

Several minutes pass by, Morty watches his grandfather kneel down to the sidewalk in front of their home. Rick was never a one to share his feelings or discuss what's on his mind, and lately he's been out of it ever since he hasn't had a bottle of alcohol in almost an hour. Morty quickly catches up with him and notices the tire tracks leading from their driveway and right away he knows it's from their car, and that his parents made it out alive. "We better start walking Morty, or else we'll end up like these people." Rick's sober voice greatly confuses Morty, he's used to him belching and slurring his words frequently whenever he speaks as well as his constant drunk rambles that make little sense to him, but enough sense to get them around the universe in one piece.  
"That sounds like a good idea." Morty follows alongside Rick as the two of them walk down the middle of the road in complete silence, avoiding the attention of the lingering dead that shuffle along in their own direction with the sun setting behind them, illuminating the road with the streetlights and the sound of snarling and stumbling off in the distance. _I wonder if we actually will make it out alive, one bite from these things and you're gone; just like them. I don't even have anything useful to make anything with either._ Rick's mind begins to trail off, thinking about his daughter and his dumb son in-law and how they're doing. He wonders if they're waiting for him and Morty somewhere, filling him with enough determination to at least stay in this timeline and attempt to fix it instead of abandoning it like the other's.

 _Hang in there Beth, I'm coming._


End file.
